Introduction
I grew up
memorizing The Lord’s Prayer, or the
Our Father as some people call it, in both English and German. Having grown up
in the Catholic Church, reciting The
Lord’s Prayer was just something you did pretty much like everything else
in the Catholic Church. You did it because that’s just what you did as part of
the many religious rituals established by the Catholic Church. Unfortunately, The Lord’s Prayer also became
synonymous with punishment for me. In the Catholic Church there is a formal
practice of private confession where you enter a confessional both and face the
priest through an obscure screen and confess your sins. The priest then absolves
you of your sins and metes out some sort of “penance” which included, among
other things, the repetitive recitation of The
Lord’s Prayer. I can’t even begin to tell you how unbiblical this practice
is, so I’ll illustrate its flaw by giving you some of the synonyms for
“penance.” Penance is also defined as “atonement, expiation, self-punishment,
self-mortification, self-abasement, amends, punishment, penalty.” In short,
here’s the problem I have with this—penance is trying to do for ourselves all
the things that Jesus has already done for us! And certainly, The Lord’s Prayer was never, ever
intended to be an instrument of punishment! Are you kidding me? Don’t get me
wrong, we are specifically called to confess our sins to one another and pray
for each other according to James 5:16, but for the purpose of healing and
repentance not for the purpose of punishment or atonement all the while understanding
that the person to whom we make our confessions struggles with sin as well—even
if that person is a priest. Unfortunately, by combining The Lord’s Prayer with atonement and punishment and then mixing in
the fact that it is a prayer to the Father when I already had a distorted view
of “father” because of the poor relationship with my earthly father and his
often brutal punishments, and The Lord’s
Prayer becomes something ugly and a source of pain instead of a beautiful
image of reverence and love and a source of peace and comfort. So I want to
take a close look at The Lord’s Prayer
given to us by Jesus and try and repackage it into the gift it was always
intended to be.
Subject Text
Matthew 6:5-13
5“And when
you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by men. I
tell you the truth, they have received their reward in full. 6But
when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret,
will reward you. 7And when you pray, do not keep on babbling like pagans, for they think they will be heard because of their
many words. 8Do not be like them, for your Father
knows what you need before you ask him. 9This, then,
is how you should pray: ‘Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your
name, 10your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. 11Give us today our daily
bread. 12Forgive us our debts, as we also have
forgiven our debtors. 13And lead us not into
temptation, but deliver us from the evil one.’”
Context
It is
important to remember that Jesus’ teaching in our Subject Text falls right in the middle of His ongoing teaching in
what we know was His Sermon on the Mount that begins in chapter five and
continues through chapter seven. These three chapters in the Gospel of Matthew
contain some of Jesus’ greatest teachings. Specifically, the Sermon on the
Mount changed or reversed some of the Jews’ long-held beliefs and customs.
Specifically, Jesus uses the familiar, “You have heard it said…but I tell you”
formula to reorient the people to a new way, or more accurately, the correct
way of thinking in respect to God and the world. Jesus was trying to get the
people to look beyond the letter of the Law and recognize the spirit of the Law
and that the spirit of the Law always served to reinforce relationship—relationship
with God and relationship with one another. Jesus wanted to teach the people
how to relate to God on a personal level as opposed to a religious level. The
religious leaders wanted to be revered by the people so their actions, including
their verbose and public prayers, were motivate by the applause and approval by
the people. Jesus wanted to redirect the people’s adoration and approval back
toward God. In doing so, Jesus gave them a simple prayer as a way to relate to
God in reverence and love.
Text Analysis
Jesus takes
a back-handed crack at the religious leaders in v. 5 when he tells the people
not to pray “like the hypocrites.” Wow! Jesus, never one to mince words exposes
some people, especially the religious leaders, as simply wanting to give the
public appearance of being holy and self-righteous. A good example of this can
be found in one of Jesus’ parables recorded in Luke’s Gospel.
9To some who were confident of their own
righteousness and looked down on everybody else, Jesus told this parable: 10“Two
men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax
collector. 11The Pharisee stood up and prayed about himself: ‘God, I
thank you that I am not like other men—robbers, evildoers, adulterers—or even
like this tax collector. 12I fast twice a week and give a tenth of
all I get.’ 13But the tax collector stood at a distance. He would
not even look up to heaven, but beat his breast and said, ‘God, have mercy on
me, a sinner.’ 14I tell you that this man, rather
than the other, went home justified before God. For everyone who exalts himself
will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted (Lk 18:9-14).”
The only
problem for those who pray in order to impress those around them is that God
isn’t impressed and their only applause and reward will be those they receive
in this life and will not be carried forward as any kind of merit in the life
to come. Prayer as I have said before is not about what others think about you
and they’re not even about your words but instead, our prayers reveal our heart
in relationship to God’s love, grace, mercy, and provision. “The word hypocrite is based on the Greek
theatrical words that mean ‘actor’ or ‘to play a part.’ The essential identity
of hypocrites, therefore, is that they pretend to be something they are not…in
the Gospels the implications are more specific: hypocrites pretend to be
paragons of religious piety while lacking spiritual virtue in their inner
souls. They honor God with their lips, but their heart is far from him. The
Pharisees are the prototypical hypocrites of the Bible. A composite portrait is
easy to assemble from Jesus’ denunciations of them. They are ostentatious when
they give alms with the intent that people will praise them. They pray in the
synagogues and street corners so people will take note. When they fast, they
disfigure their faces. They tithe their garden produce but neglect ‘the
weightier matters of the law, justice and mercy and faith.’ In Jesus’
caricature of them, they clean the outside of a drinking cup but ignore the
filth inside it. They are self-righteous, they teach false religious beliefs,
and they prevent people from entering the kingdom of heaven. They try to trap
Jesus by pretending to be perplexed about issues. We are not surprised that
they have a special place in hell. Jesus’ climactic exposure of hypocrites is
to picture them as ‘whitewashed tombs,’ which outwardly appear beautiful, but
within are full of dead men’s bones and all uncleanness.”[1]
In keeping
with his teaching method throughout the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus is making a
contrast of v. 6 with the previous verse. The people greatly esteemed the
public prayer spectacle of the religious leaders but Jesus wants them to
recognize that there is a different way; a way that honors God; a way that God
rewards because it is the way of relationship with God and not simply a
religious ritual. Jesus says in v. 6 that prayer is always first a private and
personal expression of our relationship with God. We have to be careful not to
over-interpret Jesus’ instruction in v. 6. Jesus isn’t saying that we aren’t
allowed to pray in public. This is evident by the parable I referenced
previously from Luke. The tax collector was in the same public setting as was
the Pharisee yet the prayer of the tax collector was the one Jesus identified
as justified. So let’s remember that when we seek to understand v. 6 of our Subject Text. Jesus is talking about
true prayer as opposed to theatrical prayer. The text implies a personal,
intimate relationship with God—“Carefully shutting thy door, the door to thine
own retreat, to exclude all but thy Father, with as much secrecy as if you were
about a guilty act. What delicacy of feeling, as well as sincerity, is implied
by all this; greatly to be respected, often sinned against. He who is in the
secret place; perhaps with allusion to God’s presence in the dark holy of
holies. He is there in the place from which all fellow-men are excluded. Is
social prayer negatived by this directory? No, but it is implied that social
prayer will be a reality only in proportion as it proceeds from a gathering of
men accustomed to private prayer.”[2]
Jesus turns
his criticism from the hypocritical Pharisees and takes direct aim at the
prayer practices of pagans in v. 7-8. We tend to think that pagans are those
who don’t believe in God. However, technically, those who don’t believe in God
are simply referred to as unbelievers while pagans are followers of a
polytheistic religion. For example, the Greeks would be considered pagans
because of the many gods that form their theological paradigm. And this would
be the backdrop for Jesus’ reference to “pagans.” “Greek prayers piled up as
many titles of the deity addressed as possible, hoping to secure his or her
attention. Pagan prayers typically reminded the deity of favors done or
sacrifices offered, attempting to get a response from the god on contractual
grounds.”[3]
But Jesus tells his audience not to be like the pagans in v. 8. This verse is
the hinge-point of our Subject Text
and is important to keep in mind during all our prayers. Specifically, God does
not need to be “reminded” of anything as the pagans attempted to do with their
long-winded prayers to their many gods. Nor will God be leveraged to give us
what we need or want based on all the “good” things we’ve done for Him or
otherwise. God needs nothing and knows everything so our prayers to him must
mean something else. If you’ve read or listened to any number of my other
lessons then you know what that “something else” is—that’s right, it’s again
about relationship; having a right and intimate relationship with the Creator
of the universe who loves us unconditionally. “Judaism recognized that God knew
everything; the issue here is thus not Jesus’ hearers’ doctrine but their
hearts. Jewish people saw God differently than Greeks saw their gods (even
though monotheistic faith was not always what it should have been). In Judaism,
God was a Father who delighted in meeting the needs of his people; Judaism also
recognized that God knew all a person’s thoughts. Jesus predicates effective
prayer on a relationship of intimacy, not a business partnership model, which
was closer to the one followed by ancient paganism.”[4]
Jesus then
introduces the people to a new prayer beginning in v. 9. Note that Jesus
accomplishes two very important things in the opening verse of this prayer. The
first thing Jesus establishes is the intimacy of prayer in that we are praying
to “Our Father.” Jesus uses the term Abba
to refer to God as Father. Abba is
Aramaic for “daddy” and is used in the same intimate sense that a small child
would refer to his or her father. However, the second thing Jesus establishes
is that this Father is wholly different in that He is our Father in heaven
where he rules all creation with perfect justice and holiness. Try not to
imagine heaven in terms of geography but in terms of God’s presence there.
Heaven is heaven because God resides there—wherever God resides, there is also
heaven and as such, the name of God is honored and revered (for more on the
significance of God’s name and specifically the name of Jesus Christ, see my
previous lesson titled, What’s In A Name,
at: http://seredinski.blogspot.com/2013/04/whats-in-name.html).
“Use of this intimate term for God (almost equivalent to the English ‘Daddy’)
was virtually unparalleled in first-century Judaism. Christians should consider
God as accessible as the most loving human parent. (“Father” should not be read
as implying that God has a gender or sexuality.) The phrase ‘in heaven’
balances this intimacy with an affirmation of God’s sovereignty and majesty.
The use of the first-person plural pronouns throughout the prayer reminds us
that our praying ought to reflect the corporate unity, desires, and needs of
the entire church. The Lord’s Prayer is not simply a private utterance. The
intimacy Christians have with their Heavenly Father is balanced also with
insistence on reverence in the clause ‘hallowed be your name.’ ‘Name’ refers to
one’s person, character, and authority. All that God stands for should be
treated as holy and honored because of his utter perfection and goodness.”[5]
For the
Jews, praying for God’s kingdom to come in v. 10, was an anticipation of God’s
Anointed One establishing His rule on earth and thereby liberating Israel from
any oppression and restoring her to national prominence. However, this is a
truncated understanding of “kingdom” as Jesus taught. Additionally, this verse
concedes that God’s way; God’s will is best for His creation. “The kingdom of
God is a most important concept in this Gospel. There is a sense in which the
kingdom is a present reality, but here it is the future kingdom that is in mind.
The petition looks to the coming of the time when all evil will be done away
and people will gladly submit to the divine Sovereign…The prayer looks for God
to take action, not for worshipers to bring the kingdom into being. The prayer
looks for the full realization of all that the kingdom means and for the will
of God to be perfectly done…The prayer looks for the perfect accomplishment of
what God wills, and that in the deeds of those he created as well as in what he
does himself. It points to no passive acquiescence but to an active
identification of the worshiper with the working out of the divine purpose, if
we pray that way we must live that way. We see something of the cost of praying
this prayer by reflecting on the way Jesus used it. In heaven God’s will is
perfectly done now, for there is nothing in heaven to hinder it, and the prayer
looks for a similar state of affairs here on earth.”[6]
It’s
important not to read v. 11 too narrowly. It is a request for God to provide
bread for the day but that is too narrow an understanding of the verse. What
Jesus is saying is that we can seek God to provide for our daily
needs—physically, psychologically, and spiritually. What we are communicating
through v. 11 is that we acknowledge and trust that God is the Provider and
Sustainer of everything we need. This is an important distinction. We are not
praying for God to provide us with what we want but instead what we need and
confessing, by default, that God knows what we need as Jesus taught at the end
of v. 8. “The reference to ‘bread’ is an example of synecdoche, a part-whole
figure of speech for ‘food,’ but especially referring to all of the believer’s
needs, both physical and spiritual. Disciples are to rely on God for all their
needs. The adjective translated ‘daily’ ([Gk] epiousios) occurs in the New Testament only here and in the
parallel in Luke 11:3. Its connection with ‘bread’ has been broadly debated,
with the suggestions ‘for the present day,’ ‘for necessary existence today,’
‘for the coming day,’ and ‘for the Day’ (i.e., the blessing today of the coming
eschatological Day of the Lord.)”[7]
It can
sometimes be confusing to try and understand v. 12 because the Greek word for
“debt” has been variously translated as “sins” so that the verse reads “Forgive
us our sins as we forgive those who sin against us.” However the Greek opheilEmata actually means “owes” or
“debts” and opheiletais actually
means “owers” or “debtors.” So what exactly is Jesus trying to say here? The
easiest way for me to explain it is to think of our sins as creating a debt we
owe to God who is perfectly holy and righteous and cannot allow sin to go
unpunished. Each sin represents a debt entry in God’s heavenly ledger book. In
this verse, we are, in essence, telling God we can’t pay our debt to Him and
asking him to forgive what we owe. “Literally, Jesus invites us to ask God to
release the debts that we owe against his account book. The image of debts was
a graphic one to most of Jesus’ contemporaries. While debts include money, most
of Jesus’ hearers would have been borrowers rather than lenders, so Jesus
probably includes more than merely economic debts. It is clear that debts
before God represent ‘sins,’ as they normally did both in Jewish teaching and
in the Aramaic term used for both concepts. This text helps us forgive by
reminding us of the magnitude of God’s forgiveness.”[8]
The beauty of this verse is its correlation to Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross.
You see, the forgiveness of sins doesn’t occur in a vacuum. Yes God forgives
our sins, but not simply because we ask. God forgives our sins when we
acknowledge that Jesus Christ paid the debt of our sins on our behalf. God is
quick to forgive sin but that doesn’t mean that He simply winks at sin as
though it is meaningless. Our sins create an eternal offense against an eternal
God and can only be forgiven by an eternal atonement and that eternal atonement
can only be effected by the same eternal God—Jesus Christ. Here’s how Paul
described it:
13And you, who were dead in
your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made
alive together with him [with Christ], having forgiven us all our trespasses, 14by canceling the record of debt that stood against us
with its legal demands. This he set aside, nailing it to the cross (Col 2:13-14
English Standard Version).
Paul says
that the struggle in our lives is “not against flesh and blood, but against the
rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and
against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms (Eph 6:12).” This
is what Jesus wants us to address in v. 13 when we ask God to not just direct
us away from the temptations that Satan throws at us daily but to protect us
from Satan himself who Peter says is on the prowl like a “roaring lion looking
for someone to devour (1 Pet 5:8).” Although God does not tempt us, He may, at
times, allow us to be tempted by the evil in the world directed by Satan. This
prayer asks God not to lead us into any temptation for fear of failing under
the weight of that temptation. However, Paul reminds us that, “No temptation
has overtaken you except what is common to mankind. And God is faithful; he
will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted,
he will also provide a way out so that you can endure it (1 Cor 10:13).” “This
petition is not so much for God not to lead the disciple into a moral test as
it is for the disciple to be delivered from Satan so as not to yield to
temptation…When disciples pray for protection from temptation to sin, they pray
for God to break the cycle that so often plagues them. Temptation leads to sin,
and sin leads to the necessity of praying for forgiveness. Prayer for
protection from temptation and deliverance from the evil one’s strategies
breaks the cycle.”[9]
Application
I don’t
want you to fall into the trap of simply reciting The Lord’s Prayer like some kind of magic incantation that loses
its meaning. Instead, it should be part of the intimate communication you have
with your heavenly Daddy. In order to realize the full impact of the prayer, I
want you to try and personalize it to your life. There are many ways of doing
this but I want to share one particular method created by Pastor Bill
Gaultiere, Ph.D.
V. 9—This, then, is
how you should pray: Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name.
“Father your name is so precious to us! I’m amazed that
you, the Creator and Lord Almighty, the holy and eternal one, would reveal
yourself as Father. I was as an orphan when you came to adopt me into your
loving family. I’m so privileged to be your child. You are always good and
gracious. You bring heaven right here, right now. I love you!”
V. 10—Your kingdom
come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.
“Jesus, we were foreigners, outside your kingdom when you
came to us and invited us to become citizens in your kingdom of heaven! Yes,
Jesus, I want you to govern my life! I want to work with you to advance your
kingdom in my heart and life and through me to others. What are you leading me
to do? (Listen for his answer!) Guide me in your will and your way today. I
want all that I think, all that I desire, all that I say and do to be in
partnership with you. I welcome whatever you have for me to do today. Use the
events of this day to make me more like you Jesus and to accomplish your will
through me.”
V. 11—Give us today
our daily bread.
“Lord we come before you as hungry beggars and ask you to
please provide what we need. Most of all we need you. I need you. You’re the
Bread of Life that I hunger for. I long for your presence and power, your words
and works. Make me your waiter who passes out the bread of life to others.”
V. 12—And forgive us
our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors.
“Jesus
we cry out for your mercy. We come to you as guilty sinners. I'm sorry for my
sins. I’ve hurt you and others and myself. Please forgive me for [my sins]. And
just as you have accepted me so also I forgive [those who have sinned against
me]. Wash us clean in the [your] blood…Free us from guilt and resentment and
all the depression and anxiety and conflicts they create.”
V. 13—And lead us not
into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one.
“Lord, we’ve been prisoners of war, defeated by dark
powers, trapped in sinful patterns. You’ve forgiven us, but still we’re
tempted. Save me Jesus! Set me free from the things that tempt me. Give me the
strength to walk with you Jesus…Make us your soldiers, fighting your battles in
your power to advance your kingdom.”[10]
There are countless other ways to
make the prayer more personal and therefore more meaningful to you
specifically. Or perhaps now that you have a fuller understanding of the text, The Lord’s Prayer just as it is speaks
to your heart in the way a discussion with your Lord and Savior was intended
to.
[1] Leland Ryken, James C.
Wilhoit, Tremper Longman III, gen. eds., Dictionary
of Biblical Imagery, (Downers Grove, IL: IVP Academic, 1998), p. 415.
[2] W. Robertson Nicoll, ed., The Expositor’s Greek Testament, Vol. 1,
(Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1983), p. 118.
[3] Craig S. Keener, The IVP Bible Backgroud Commentary—New
Testament, (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1993), p. 62.
[4] Ibid.
[5] Craig L. Blomberg, Matthew—The New American Commentary,
(Nashville, TN: Broadman Press, 1992), p. 119.
[6] Leon Morris—The Gospel According to Matthew—Pillar
New Testament Commentary, (Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans Publishing
Co., 1992), pp. 145-146.
[7] Michael J. Wilkins, Matthew—The NIV Application Commentary,
(Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2004), pp. 277-278.
[8] Craig S. Keener, Matthew—The IVP New Testament Commentary
Series, (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1997), p. 144.
[9] David L. Turner, Matthew—Baker Exegetical Commentary on
the New Testament, (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2008), p. 189.
[10] William Gaultiere, Ph.D, Living The Lord’s Prayer, www.newhopenow.org (accessed May 4, 2014).
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